When was direct current discovered

From these studies Henry, in partnership with Michael Faraday, discovered the principles behind the dynamo and an electric generator was devised, allowing the subsequent development of the electrical motor.

It was however Thomas Edison who took these theories to the next level by creating the largest ever dynamo, known as the Edison Dynamo, in Following Edison, Europe and America built the first plants for electrical distribution to support the use of electricity to power lighting. With the dynamo still creating DC electricity, however, there was a need for the electricity to be moved further around the world.

There was a great need to find a way of doing this without the power losses associated with moving DC along great distances.

So from all the work that had been done by Joseph Henry and Michael Faraday the alternating transformer was created. Thus AC electricity was born, allowing electricity to travel greater distances to feed the growing world we see today. Now we know how the two forms of electricity were discovered it will allow us to answer the question of what the difference is between AC and DC electricity?

DC electricity is electricity flowing in a constant direction with a voltage with constant polarity the term used to describe the current flow in an electrical circuit. AC electricity is voltages alternating in polarity in a natural way reversing positively and negatively over time.

The way that electricity is produced has key differences too, due to the way generators produce the electricity. AC electricity can be generated relatively easily, compared to DC. AC generators are made up of a magnetic field rotating around fixed coils; when it turns, an AC voltage will be produced as the magnet passes the wire coils.

While DC generators also work on the principle of electromagnetic induction, the way they are put together is a lot different from AC generation. In practice AC is a lot easier to produce, and it has become the more common way of producing the electricity today.

This is also linked to what we found out about the history of electricity: that DC does not have the same ability as AC to travel distances due to power loss.

This is why we use AC in our houses and factories. For example, in the Americas and Japan a volt system is standard, but Europe and most of the world uses twice that voltage, volts. Nikola Tesla did careful calculations to come up with the 60 Hz number as the best frequency. To make matters even stranger, the lower voltage systems run at 60 Hertz, or 60 oscillations per second, while the rest of the world runs at 50 Hz. At that time, AEG had a virtual monopoly and their standard spread to the rest of the continent.

In Britain, differing frequencies proliferated, and only after World War II the cycle standard was established. The voltage standard was originally v in Europe as well. Working with a certain copper wire diameter, Europe thought it necessary to increase voltage for fewer losses and less voltage drop. The United States wanted to do the same, but when this was being considered in the 50s and 60s, many American households had appliances like washing machines and refrigerators and the cost of replacing them was prohibitive.

Most European households did not yet have those appliances, and it was an easier switch. Staying at this lower voltage actually caused problems in the U. The solution was to run volts to each building, and then split it into two V lines. Although some appliances like dryers and ovens use V in the Americas, some of these appliances still do not work with European power due to the phase difference of 60 Hz vs 50 Hz.

Map of voltages with v in red and v in blue. Image Credit: WorldStandards. Without the great work of Edison and Tesla, our day to day lives as we know it today would not be possible. It turns out that AC is great for some purposes like long distance travel and DC is great for other purposes like computers, LEDs, and electric vehicles. Alternating current reverses direction a certain number of times per second -- 60 in the U.

Edison, not wanting to lose the royalties he was earning from his direct current patents, began a campaign to discredit alternating current. He spread misinformation saying that alternating current was more dangerous, even going so far as to publicly electrocute stray animals using alternating current to prove his point. Although some doubted that the falls could power all of Buffalo, New York, Tesla was convinced it could power not only Buffalo, but also the entire Eastern United States.

On Nov. By this time General Electric had decided to jump on the alternating current train, too. It would appear that alternating current had all but obliterated direct current, but in recent years direct current has seen a bit of a renaissance. Today our electricity is still predominantly powered by alternating current, but computers, LEDs, solar cells and electric vehicles all run on DC power.